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The morning after: Is reconciliation wishful thinking?

By Erika Stutzman

Posted:
11/08/2012 09:22:22 AM MST

Updated:
11/08/2012 09:23:19 AM MST

With his most gracious concession speech, former Gov. Mitt Romney sounded quite the opposite from the candidate he sometimes had to be -- a man trying to garner the tea party support from within the Republican Party.

And to find the opposite of that graciousness, one only needs to look to tea party hero and Fox News contributor Dick Morris, who again and again told his fandom that this was going to be a Romney landslide despite all signs to the contrary. He chose to lash out at a governor dealing with total devastation.

"But the more proximate cause of my error was that I did not take full account of the impact of hurricane Sandy and of Gov. Chris Christie's bipartisan march through New Jersey arm in arm with President Obama. Not to mention Christie's fawning promotion of Obama's presidential leadership."

Christie, a Romney backer, buried the bipartisan bat and was attacked by extreme partisans for making New Jersey residents and his job as governor priority No. 1. The vast majority of the public response to his leadership after the storm was positive.

On Tuesday, tea party favorites Richard Mourdock of Indiana and Todd Akin of Missouri lost Senate seats once expected to be a lock; so did Illinois Rep. Joe Walsh.

On Wednesday at least, it seemed like Republicans were listening more to Romney's popular appeal to work together than to the Morris temper tantrum.

Rep.

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Cory Gardner (4th CD): "Now that the election is behind us, it is time for us to come together, not as Democrats or Republicans, but as Americans to tackle the many challenges facing our nation. We must grow the economy, put Coloradans back to work, and get control of our massive debt and deficit."

Scott Tipton (Rep.-3rd CD): "In my second term I remain committed to working across the aisle towards common sense solutions to the problems facing the 3rd Congressional District. We must jumpstart this economy and get Coloradans back to work."

Republican House Speaker John Boehner, whose own experience has been more defined by tea party obstruction than his considerable seat of power, may be drumming up his own courage after their performance this week. He pledged to work on a bipartisan basis with the White House to avoid the upcoming "fiscal cliff" of automatic tax hikes and spending cuts.

"The American people this week didn't give us a mandate to do the 'simple' thing. They elected us to lead. They gave us a mandate to work together to do the best thing for our country," he said.

The campaigns, from the clown-car like spectacle of the Republican primaries all the way through the relentless negative advertising by both parties, were dismal. Election day was exciting, but it's over. And on a sunny Colorado Wednesday, most of what we saw were messages of reconciliation. Hope springs eternal.

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